Max Verstappen was at a loss to describe why his Red Bull Formula 1 car became “undriveable” during the Austrian Grand Prix, costing him an almost guaranteed win.
Having surged to pole position with a four-tenth advantage, Verstappen was cruising in the lead with a nine-second margin over Lando Norris across the opening stint.
However, the Dutchman was heard complaining about the minimal grip he was experiencing as his second stint unfolded and Norris made inroads on the leading gap.
Red Bull was sluggish to respond to Verstappen’s remonstrations and even slower in the pitlane as a 6.5s stop enabled the McLaren to end up right the Red Bull’s rear.
Verstappen was unable to shake Norris’ advances and repelled several attacks until the two collided at Turn 3, handing both punctures and wrecking their win chance.
The reigning champion, who was penalised but managed to come home in fifth position to extend his championship, labelled his race at the Red Bull Ring a “disaster”.
“I think the first stint was quite good then at the end of that first stint I caught quite a bit of traffic, we should have boxed, because I just gave up free lap time,” he said.
“So we basically did a lot of things wrong today, I think starting with strategy, then the pit stops were a disaster, the first one was really bad, the second one even more of a disaster.
“Then you give free lap time, six seconds over those two pit stops, then of course it’s a race again and that’s why we put ourselves in that position.
“Unfortunate then of course for an accident to happen between us, which you never want to happen, but we did everything wrong that we could have done today.”
Verstappen was unable to summon a reason behind him going from controlling proceedings with ease to ending up powerless to prevent Norris from cutting his gap.
“Today was just very bad, I have no explanation why suddenly the car just transformed from an OK balance in the first stint to just undriveable behaviour afterwards.
“Which normally indicates something was also wrong, but even with that we should have won today without so many errors in the pit stops.”
Although Verstappen switched to a used Medium compound while Norris was on a new set, the Red Bull driver has denied that could explain his sudden drop in pace.
“They both felt bad so I don’t think we did the wrong thing with the tyres,” he elucidated.
“My balance in the first stint wasn’t even that bad, but I don’t know why the car started to feel worse and worse throughout the race.
“So that is also something we have to look into, that maybe something broke on the car.”
When it was put to him that he seemed more agitated with the team’s execution, Verstappen added: “Yeah because today has been awful, everything has been wrong.
“I’m complaining about the tyres, we didn’t pit, I was stuck in traffic, bad, bad execution with the pit stops, so everything just went wrong.”
Verstappen, who cautioned earlier in the weekend that Red Bull couldn’t treat its rivals catching up as normal, believes that proves it will be beaten unless it’s flawless.
“Everything needs to be perfect to win, we have done that well for a lot of races and today we did everything wrong and you put yourself in that position,” he explained.
Isn’t it funny that as soon as someone starts to challenge him he reverts to moves that don’t meet the rules and suddenly the car is undrivable!